All language subtitles for Ancient.Aliens.S20E15.jacques.vallee.ufo.pioneer.(2024)

NARRATOR:
Jacques Vallée.

Astronomer.
Computer scientist.

Best-selling author.
Internet pioneer.

And world-renowned
UFO researcher.

GEORGE KNAPP: I think he's
the most important thinker

the topic has ever had.

NARRATOR: Jacques Vallée
was one of the first to suggest

the UFO phenomenon
dates back thousands of years.

GIORGIO A. TSOUKALOS:
Jacques Vallée
asked the question,

these ancient stories
that we have,

are they identical to
modern-day UFO phenomenon?

NARRATOR:
And his bold theories
dare to challenge

not only our notions
of extraterrestrial life,

but of the universe itself.

There are very few concepts
that are standard

in every part
of human civilization.

UFOs are,
and they are across time.

This is real,
and it's important.

NARRATOR:
There is a doorway
in the universe.

Beyond it is
the promise of truth.

It demands
we question everything

we have ever been taught.

The evidence is all around us.

The future is
right before our eyes.

We are not alone.

We have never been alone.

DvX3M
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NARRATOR:
In 1952, the United States
government launched its first

major investigation
into the UFO phenomenon,

called Project Blue Book.

More than five decades later,
in 2007,

the government initiated

its second serious UFO project
called "The Advanced Aviation

Threat Identification Program,"
or AATIP.

There is only one man
who was a key contributor

to both of these efforts,

and he remains at the forefront

of UFO research, even today:

Dr. Jacques Vallée.

PAUL HYNEK: I don't know of
anybody else like Jacques Vallée

in the UFO field.

He brings scientific background,

artificial intelligence,
computer engineering training,

and insatiable curiosity
to the phenomenon.

He has degrees in
mathematics and astrophysics,

and a PhD in computer science.

And his ideas have had
such a tremendous impact

on ufology as a serious subject.

It validates its study
among academics.

Jacques Vallée is,
in my estimation,

not only the deepest thinker,

but the best writer to
ever tackle the UFO mystery.

He's the author of
several seminal books,

deeply influential in the field.

He's helped to sort of expand
what we think of

as the UFO world.

TSOUKALOS:
He's one of the first people
that asked the question

is it possible that these
ancient stories that we have,

are they identical
to what we see

with the modern-day
UFO phenomenon?

RICHARD DOLAN:
I honestly believe if you look
at the whole history of just

UFO researchers, you could
really say that Jacques Vallée

is the most brilliant
of them all.

JACQUES VALLÉE:
Still, people ask me,
"Do you believe in UFOs?"

Well, you shouldn't wonder
if you want to be

a believer or a non-believer.

As a scientist, I mean,
there are reports of UFOs,

and I want to study
those reports

to see if there is a pattern,
and what that pattern

would tell me about
what is happening,

and how we could design
a methodology to study it.

This is pure science.

NARRATOR:
As one of the first people
to suggest

that UFOs are not only
a modern-day phenomenon,

Jacques Vallée is considered
a pioneer by both ufologists

and ancient astronaut
theorists alike.

For Vallée, UFOs have
been a lifelong passion.

One that was sparked
by his very own close encounter.

On a bright afternoon
in this small town

30 miles northwest of Paris,

15-year-old Jacques Vallée
comes running out of his house

when he hears his mother
calling out from the garden.

I saw an object that,
to this day, you know,

I have to say was a UFO.
It was a very clear disc.

It was in the direction
of the church of the city.

This was not any airplane
that you could imagine.

So the next day, I spoke
to a friend of mine from, uh,

the college,
and he had seen it, too.

His house was about half
a mile up the hill from us,

and he had looked
at it with binoculars,

and I asked him to draw it.

And what he drew was exactly
the same thing I saw.

DOLAN:
What was interesting is that
Jacques Vallée has his friend

draw what he sees.

Very, you know, good
investigative technique there.

So you could really see,
even as a young man,

he was approaching this
as rationally

and scientifically
as you're able to do.

And that's a path
that he has always followed.

NARRATOR:
The encounter had a profound
effect on young Jacques Vallée,

who went on to study
mathematics and astrophysics

before being hired to
work as an astronomer

at the Paris Observatory
in 1961.

While there, he took advantage
of the observatory's computer

to advance his UFO research,

comparing data from reports
all over the world.

VALLÉE:
I started using the computer
to find out

about patterns among UFOs.

And that's when
I really became interested

and felt that I could make
a contribution.

And after that, I was recruited
by the University of Texas.

They knew exactly what I had
been doing with the computer,

and that, uh, they said,
you know, that I could use

the computer in Austin to work,
to look for UFO patterns.

So this was, uh,
very exciting after that.

NARRATOR:
In 1962, Vallée moved
to Austin, Texas

to work with astronomers
mapping the planet Mars.

But his plans soon changed
when he got

an opportunity to meet
Dr. J. Allen Hynek.

Dr. Hynek was the chairman of
the astronomy department

at Northwestern University.

But more importantly
to Jacques Vallée,

he was also
the scientific advisor

for one of the first
government task forces

to investigate the UFO
phenomenon: "Project Blue Book."

Begun in March of 1952,
the classified

U.S. Air Force project studied
UFO reports and sightings

to determine whether they were
a threat to national security.

My wife and I flew from Austin
to Chicago and met with Hynek.

And I had brought
some of my database records

of close encounter cases
in Europe,

and especially in France.

And the statistics
I had done from the database

on the computer from Austin.

And Dr. Hynek was
very interested

because, of course,
the Air Force was

accumulating records,
under Project Blue Book.

NARRATOR:
At the age of 24,
Jacques Vallée began working

as an aide for Hynek
on Project Blue Book,

and spent four years
going through

the 20,000 UFO cases on file.

Dr. Hynek said as an astronomer,

you're supposed to be curious.

You are not there
just to explain things

to the public.

You are there to...
to look at the mysteries.

And if there is a mystery,

that's your job, to document it,

to try to do the work for it.

NICK POPE:
Hynek became Vallée's mentor,
and clearly Hynek

recognized something
in Jacques Vallée.

He said, wow, you know,
here's a smart person,

a scientist, fellow scientist
interested in,

knowledgeable about,
and passionate about UFOs,

but wanting to apply
exactly the sort of scientific

methodology that Hynek was,
of course, interested in.

So the two men became
colleagues, and indeed friends.

NARRATOR:
According to J. Allen Hynek's
son Paul,

Vallée became
his father's most trusted ally.

PAUL HYNEK:
There were a parade
of graduate students

and fellow professors
at our house all the time.

And yet I could see
this special fondness

and reverence my father had
for Jacques.

Jacques became
an invaluable friend

and colleague of my father,
somebody who my father deeply

respected, who was unflinchingly
honest about the phenomena.

And I would say courageous
about pushing the boundaries

of mainstream science out
just a little bit further.

AUBEK:
The collaboration of two men

of such impeccable
scientific qualifications

enriched the field
beyond belief.

This was a defining moment
in the history of ufology.

NARRATOR:
Together, Jacques Vallée
and J. Allen Hynek

not only helped
to legitimize the study of UFOs,

but they also became
convinced that the objects

being witnessed are
not of man-made origin.

And one case that made
a bigger impression

than all the rest involved
an enormous craft,

a landing,
and even alien beings.

NARRATOR:
While working towards PhDs

in both industrial engineering
and computer science,

Jacques Vallée encourages
his mentor J. Allen Hynek

to consider investigating
not only reports

of objects in the sky

but also evidence on the ground.

VALLÉE:
I kept talking to him
about landings,

which, he called it
"close encounters,"

and the term stuck, of course.

I just called it "landings,"

where there were traces in--
on-on the ground and so on

that could be
looked at physically.

And then he said, "But you go
through the Air Force files,

and you're going to see
very, very few landings."

And I said, "Well,
let me go through the files

and I'll show you
some landings."

The reason they didn't show up
was they were all explained

as aberrations
or hallucinations.

But you would find
very credible witnesses,

and you would find traces.

And the thing that clinched it
was the case

in Socorro, New Mexico.

In Socorro,

not only was there a landing,
there were beings.

NARRATOR:
Socorro, New Mexico,

April 24, 1964,

5:45 p.m.

While chasing a speeding car,

police sergeant Lonnie Zamora
hears a thunderous roar

and sees a flame in the sky
to the southwest.

Thinking a local dynamite shack
might have exploded,

Zamora leaves the chase
to investigate.

(insects chirping)

POPE:
Lonnie Zamora sees something.

A landed craft,

essentially egg-shaped.

He sees some figures,

and he says afterwards
they were either

big children or small adults,

which, again,
raises the question,

were these extraterrestrials,
as many believe?

Suddenly,
when he got reasonably close,

they got back in
and this thing took off.

NARRATOR:
Zamora examined the area

with fellow
police sergeant Sam Chavez.

Both officers documented

that the brush was burning
in several places

and the object had left
four perpendicular impressions

on the ground.

Dozens of other investigators
arrived on the scene

shortly after the incident
and in the days that followed.

VALLÉE:
You had, actually,
four levels of investigation.

You had the Socorro cops,

you had the FBI
happened to be there,

you had the security detail
from the airfield

and you had
special investigations

with the Air Force,
sending Dr. Hynek.

And that became part
of Project Blue Book

as an "unidentified"
by all the investigators

who had been there.

Jacques told me
that it was this case

that was more or less the straw
that broke the camel's back

that made my father
feel comfortable

speaking about beings

as opposed to just crafts
in public.

VALLÉE:
It was a difficult transition

for Dr. Hynek
to admit that, yes,

not only were landings important

but they were
the greatest source

of actual physical data
that you could take to the lab.

NARRATOR:
For Jacques Vallée,

collecting data is the key
to solving the UFO mystery.

As part of his effort
to create a global UFO database,

Vallée, with the help
from Dr. Hynek,

began building an international
network of scientists

investigating the phenomenon.

They called themselves
the Invisible College,

taking the name from a group

of 18th-century
European scholars.

VALLÉE:
This was similar
to what happened

in the 18th century, uh,
with the Invisible College.

And they did
a lot of early astronomy,

early physics, chemistry,
biology and so on.

And the only reason they were
not hung or killed as witches

was because they were
protected by the king.

Dr. Hynek thought
we were sort of the, uh,

the new iteration
of the Invisible College.

People like Costa de Beauregard
in France,

like Professor Chauvin
in France,

were internationally known
in their fields,

uh, biology, relativity
and so on.

But they were very interested
in talking about UFOs with us.

Of course, this was very secret.

The Invisible College
began in Dr. Hynek's home,

where, weekly or monthly,
he would have scientists

from all around the world
visit his house,

and there, they would discuss
the UFO topic.

But they all were sworn
to secrecy, because at the time,

you couldn't talk about it
in seriousness,

especially
in the world of academia.

NARRATOR:
Although most members
of the Invisible College

remained anonymous,
Jacques Vallée did not,

and in 1965, he published
Anatomy of a Phenomenon,

one of the earliest books
written about the UFO subject

by a scientist.

DOLAN:
Anatomy of a Phenomenon

was a very, very
strong compilation

of these UFO reports
at that time.

He's looking at the data,
organizing it.

It really made his name
in the UFO field.

NARRATOR:
But as Vallée

was forging his reputation
in the field of ufology,

the U.S. government
was looking for a way

to end its UFO investigations.

In 1966, the so-called
Condon Committee,

led by physicist Edward Condon,

was commissioned
by the U.S. Air Force

to assess whether
to continue funding studies

like Project Blue Book.

DOLAN:
Their job, supposedly,
was to make

a determination,
scientifically, is this real,

is this not real,
what should the Air Force do,

should the Air Force drop
Project Blue Book?

And the answer is,
"Nothing to it."

It's not worthy of further
scientific investigation.

VALLÉE:
When the Condon study began,

it became obvious
that it was rigged

to give a negative conclusion.

I didn't want to stay
in the U.S.

under those conditions.

I thought, "If that's
what science is in America,

we don't belong in America."

NARRATOR:
After a disappointing end to
his time at Project Blue Book,

Jacques Vallée moved back
to Paris with his wife and son.

But as backlash
against UFO research

spread in the public sphere
of science and academics,

Jacques Vallée would develop

his most profound
UFO theory yet:

that aliens
have always been among us.

NARRATOR:
30-year-old Jacques Vallée

is working as an engineer

for the Royal Dutch Shell
oil and gas company

when civil unrest
erupts throughout France.

Triggered by a series
of student protests

against capitalism
and consumerism,

the unrest leads
to a nationwide strike.

Essentially,
there were three months

during which no work was done.

So, I could go back
to my own research interests,

uh, full-time.

I collected a number of books

in areas that I had wanted
to look at for a-a long time.

And the question, which is
really a scientific question,

is-- so, we have UFOs,
you know, and UFO waves--

when did that really start?

NARRATOR:
Vallée discovered that accounts
of mysterious objects in the sky

weren't limited
to contemporary reports.

In fact, the more he dug
into the origins

of the UFO phenomenon,

the further back in time
he went.

VALLÉE:
There is a lot of literature

from the Muslim world
about, uh, jinn

and about other creatures

created by God, but...
a-along with men and animals.

So, I started l-looking at this,
and what dawned on me

was that you could
go back in history,

and people will interpret it
in religious terms

as either evil or...

angels or religious apparitions.

POPE:
Jacques Vallée noticed
some connections

between modern-day UFO sightings

and ancient folkloric tales
of strange lights

and even entity encounters.

And he said, look, this
could be the same phenomenon,

but just people use
different words

according to their language,

according
to their belief systems.

VALLÉE:
I looked especially in Europe.

So many of those were fairy
tales that I had heard as a kid.

It turns out they come
from real observations.

A few folklore experts
in the 19th century

and early 20th century,

in Ireland and, uh,
Wales and Scotland,

had gone around
collecting actual reports

of people encountering,
not just little people,

but little people
with strange contraptions.

Strange houses where you would
lose your sense of time.

You would come out
and years would've passed.

And so you are beginning to see

that these people
were confronted

with another race,

that there was
communication with it.

TSOUKALOS:
Jacques Vallée realized
that many of the stories

that we have
of in the Middle Ages

of trolls and fairy folk
and things like that,

it reminded him
of similar stories

that we have today
in the UFO world.

So, he asked the question,
is it possible

that these ancient stories
that we have,

are they identical
to what we see

with the modern-day
UFO phenomenon?

NARRATOR: In 1969,
Jacques Vallée published

the culmination of this research

in a book titled
Passport to Magonia,

named for the fabled
cloud realm detailed

in medieval French folklore.

TSOUKALOS:
In that book,
he describes that perhaps

some of those old stories
and legends of fairy folk

are not necessarily made up,

but that they may
be descriptions

of visiting extraterrestrials

that our ancestors then
interpreted as fairy folk.

KNAPP: Passport to Magonia
was a game changer.

To suggest that these things,
whatever they are,

interact with humans

throughout human history,

on every continent,
in every culture.

WILLIAM HENRY: At this time,
the primary thought

about extraterrestrials

was UFOs only started
showing up in 1947

with
the Kenneth Arnold sighting.

But Vallée is starting to see
that they've always been here,

that they've shown up
in culture after culture,

and saying that this phenomena
has always been with us.

NARRATOR:
With Passport to Magonia,

Jacques Vallée
became a seminal figure

to not only ufologists,

but also
ancient astronaut theorists.

And his book came out
within just a few months

of Swiss author
Erich von Danikën's

Chariots of the Gods?,

which also posed the possibility
that extraterrestrials

had visited Earth
in the distant past.

When you read the words
of Jacques Vallée,

you can't help but be thinking

of the work
of Erich Von Däniken.

Chariots of the Gods?
and Passport to Magonia

come to the same conclusion:
this is an ancient phenomenon.

ERICH VON DÄNIKEN:
I adore some of the writings
of Jacques Vallée.

He's a brilliant man.

And of course,
out there in the universe,

there might be different forms
of extraterrestrial,

not only a human form.

They might be small beings,

bigger beings, giants.

We have no idea.

We have no idea.

NARRATOR:
Ancient astronaut theorists
cite Magonia

as one of many instances
when Jacques Vallée

found himself
at the forefront of UFO research

pushing the boundaries
of what many deemed possible.

But his most groundbreaking
theories were still to come.

Theories that would
challenge our understanding

of not just UFOs,
but the entire cosmos.

NARRATOR:
Jacques Vallée is recruited by
the National Science Foundation

to work as
a principal investigator

on a project known as ARPANET.

It was here
where he helped build

the first public computer
network ever developed.

And it is considered by many

to be the forerunner
of the Internet.

ARPA was the Advanced Research
Project Agency of the Pentagon.

There were 15 computing centers
at universities.

At Stanford Research Institute,
we had site number two,

the second computer
on the Internet.

I ran one of the projects
of many

and we implemented the first
computer conferencing systems

when the ARPANET was going
to turn into the Internet.

This is an incredible part
of-of Vallée's story.

He goes to Silicon Valley
and becomes amazingly successful

in the early days of ARPANET.

NARRATOR:
While working as a senior
research engineer at Stanford,

on his own time, Vallée
continued to compile reports

on unidentified
aerial phenomena.

And the more information
he gathered,

the more he began to question
the very nature of UFOs.

What I found
was that the ufologists

were still talking about UFOs

like they were
advanced airplanes.

Well, that ignores pretty much
everything that UFOs do.

Whatever propulsion there is,

is certainly not anything

that we account for
in our equations.

And you ask the witnesses,
how fast did it go off?

And they say, it lifted
and then it disappeared.

And the interpretation is,
they turn on, you know,

the afterburners
and they go boom.

You know, and you
don't see them anymore.

That's not true.

HENRY:
Vallée came to believe,
based on the evidence

that he saw
in the literary tradition,

and as well as what
he's seeing in the sightings

and the documentation,

that perhaps what we're
actually dealing with

is an interdimensional
phenomenon,

and that extraterrestrials

are in fact
coming from other dimensions.

CHRISSY NEWTON:
Jacques Vallée was one
of the first scientists

to ever bring in
a multi-dimensional theory

in context with the UFO topic.

Jacques was ahead of his time,

and he's open-minded enough
as a scientist

to be able to go there

and be very passionate about it.

TSOUKALOS:
Jacques Vallée
changed his opinion

from nuts-and-bolts spacecraft

to it being that we
live in a multiverse.

And that multiple existences are
happening all at the same time.

And some of the UFO sightings

might be these blips
of these civilizations

being able to move
between dimensions.

VALLÉE:
The idea that we
are in a universe

that has more than three
or four dimensions with time,

that's passé for physics going
back to, you know, 50 years ago.

I talk to scientists
and to physicists,

and they tell me
that essentially

space and time
are human perceptions.

That's where physics stands now.

This doesn't come
from the UFO people,

it comes from hard physics.

And I think part of my job,

I'm not a good enough physicist

to contribute to those ideas,

but I can bring fuel to the...
to the discussion.

NARRATOR:
Jacques Vallée shared his idea

of interdimensional travelers
with his former colleague

and longtime friend,
J. Allen Hynek.

And together, they published
the theory in the 1975 book,

The Edge of Reality.

MICHIO KAKU:
Mr. Vallée opened the door

to a new kind of ufology,

not just little green men
with flying saucers

landing on the White House lawn,

but creatures
from another dimension.

Creatures that can
go through doorways

and go between universes.

NARRATOR:
Vallée and Hynek's
controversial ideas

captured the imagination
of the public.

And not long after
the book was released,

they also caught the attention

of Hollywood's
most celebrated new filmmaker:

Steven Spielberg.

I'm convinced that there's
something going on,

but no one really knows
what it is.

Uh, Dr. Hynek certainly
d-doesn't know what it is.

I have theories,
he has theories.

No one really can put
their finger on it.

If-if they could, the mystery
would be solved.

Jacques Vallée's influence
was so profound

that he came to the attention
of director Steven Spielberg.

Vallée is the model
for the character

of Claude Lacombe,
the French scientist

that we see in Close Encounters
of the Third Kind.

VALLÉE: I heard of it
through Dr. Hynek

that one of the characters
was based on me.

And then there was
a-a reporter in-in Hollywood,

they invited Steven Spielberg
to lunch with us.

And t-the three of us had
a conversation about the movie

and he confirmed that
they wanted a scientist

who would be from another
culture, and not American,

but from another culture,
and would think about it

in different ways.

And Steven Spielberg told me
he had read my first books,

Anatomy of a Phenomenon,
was published in '65,

which meant he was studying
the subject way back.

It was wonderful because

usually in Hollywood, you know,

the aliens come down
and they start shooting.

And-and that's not
what he wanted to do.

He wanted to show
the interaction,

the human contact.

NARRATOR:
Grossing over $300 million
worldwide,

Close Encounters became
a blockbuster hit

and sparked
greater public interest

in both the UFO mystery
and Jacques Vallée.

And in the decades to come,
Vallée would once again

find himself at the center
of a secret UFO investigation

run by the U.S. government.

NARRATOR: As the end
of the 20th century approaches,

French scientist and astronomer
Jacques Vallée turns his focus

to funding
emerging technologies,

spearheading advancements

in everything
from wireless networks

to biotech and nanotechnology.

Vallée is also interested

in bringing ufology
into a new technological age

and in 1995,
he gets his opportunity

when he meets aerospace
entrepreneur Robert Bigelow.

In the mid-1990s,

billionaire Robert Bigelow
enters the UFO scene

and he is funding
a civilian scientific effort--

the National Institute
for Discovery Science--

that's looking
into the phenomena

and other related phenomena.

And he brings together

some of the very best
in the field.

And of course, naturally, this
brings him to Jacques Vallée.

VALLÉE: The research
that Mr. Bigelow funded was

absolutely remarkable.

You know, in science you have

lots of good scientists
with good ideas.

But you need somebody
who has a vision

of where the enterprise
is going to go.

Mr. Bigelow is just
a remarkable business leader.

KNAPP:
Bigelow created
his own UFO organization

devoted to figuring out
the UFO mystery and he had

this amazing group of people,

and Jacques Vallée
was one of them.

Those relationships became
seminal to the development

of the UFO topic
in the decade since.

NARRATOR:
Working with Bigelow,

Vallée created
the most comprehensive

UFO database in modern history.

Called the Capella program,
it uses artificial intelligence

to investigate patterns
behind the UFO phenomenon.

TSOUKALOS: Dr. Vallée
has amassed a database

consisting of
over 260,000 documents

all UAP-related.

Now, it took him
60 years almost to amass this.

Perhaps we can use

the new tools of AI,
for example, to crunch

those 260,000 documents
once again.

And maybe AI will
recognize some pattern.

VALLÉE:
If you tell me about something
you've seen in the sky,

there are some possibilities
that will come to me.

Maybe it's an airplane,
maybe it's a cloud.

Maybe it's-it's
a reflection of the Moon.

And there are
another 200 possibilities

my brain isn't capable
of thinking of.

AI can help.

I'm a physicist,

and step one of being
a physicist is

to collect the data.

That's the first thing you do.

And that's what Vallée
has done here.

HENRY:
Vallée is the very first
to apply computer science

to the study of UFO sightings.

And in every way is,

is finding a-a way
to apply modern technology

to the UFO phenomenon.

NARRATOR:
In December 2017,

nearly a decade after Vallée
created the Capella database,

a bombshell New York Times
article revealed

that Robert Bigelow was part
of a secret military project

known as the Advanced Aerospace
Threat Identification Program,

or AATIP.

The program was conducted
from 2007 to 2012,

receiving $22 million
in Congressional funding.

DOLAN:
This turned the whole
UFO world upside down.

And people were
kind of blown away

because the U.S. government
had always said, "Uh, we don't,

we have no interest in UFOs.
This is not a thing."

What we have learned,
subsequently, is

the AATIP program clearly was
using the Capella database,

putting more money into it
and working to build it.

So Vallée ended up having
a tremendous impact

on this secret UFO program
that now we all know about.

NARRATOR:
To many ufologists
across the world,

the unmasking of AATIP

and its use
of Vallée's Capella database

marked the beginning
of a new era.

It was the first time

that the U.S. government
openly acknowledged

the UFO issue since the end
of Project Blue Book

more than 50 years earlier

for which Jacques Vallée was
also a key contributor.

HENRY:
And this is an incredible part
of Vallée's story,

that beginning in the 1950s,
he's starting to create

databases of UFO sightings.

2017 comes
this blockbuster report.

He's almost like

a passing-through character,
but yet here he is.

And what's he doing?
Building a database.

Database, database, database.

It's all about the accumulation
of these stories

and the insights
that are contained within.

VALLÉE:
Most contemporary data we have,

unfortunately,
it's still classified.

But we can already see a lot
from what we've done

with smaller databases
that were public.

I trust that the people
are doing a good job

of working with it.

So we should have some
better answers in, in time.

NARRATOR:
As ufology enters a new chapter
in the 21st century,

Jacques Vallée remains
as relevant as ever.

And he is now
lending his expertise

to a groundbreaking effort

to identify objects in space
that might be harboring...

extraterrestrial technology.

NARRATOR:
Harvard astronomer and
astrophysicist Avi Loeb launches

a new scientific search for
extraterrestrial intelligence

called the Galileo Project.

KAKU:
Avi Loeb of Harvard is
a reputable scientist

who made lots of waves
by talking about investigating

extraterrestrial
civilizations' technology.

Professor Loeb says,

"Why not monitor meteors
and things in outer space?"

Perhaps one of them is remnants
of an advanced civilization.

That's the Galileo Project.

NARRATOR:
Among the many experts
who are contributing

to the Galileo Project
is Jacques Vallée.

VALLÉE:
We know what equipment
we can deploy

about objects that are
in the atmosphere.

We want to know
if they are coming in

and out of the atmosphere,
and where do they go?

Astronomers have been asking
those questions for a long time.

With the Galileo Project,
I'm very thankful

that I was able to work
with people who were

just giving their-their time
and their life to this.

It's just pure, pure science.

NARRATOR:
After nearly 70 years

of investigating
and documenting UFOs...

...from assisting J. Allen Hynek
on Project Blue Book

to publishing
groundbreaking books

and creating the world's
largest UFO database...

...Vallée is hopeful
that his work has brought

humanity closer to solving
an age-old mystery,

one that dates to the dawn
of recorded history.

Jacques Vallée's contributions

to the UFO field are
immeasurably valuable.

He has been one of the people
to change the paradigm,

and it has taken him
decades to do this.

He's one of the first people
that looked at the data

and said, "There's
something going on here

and it certainly merits
more investigation."

CHILDRESS:
What makes Vallée

a unique figure in the whole
ufology scene is that

he's a person whom everyone,

the skeptics and the believers,
all take very seriously.

KNAPP:
Jacques Vallée made
an impact on the world

in so many different ways.

He's a talented
science fiction writer.

He's a talented novelist.

He's a talented
computer scientist.

He was one of the earliest folks

to apply computer technology
to UFO world

to figure out
how to organize data.

Any conversation you have
with Jacques Vallée,

any interview you do with him,

he talks about the need
for more data.

There's never enough data.

My father made a lot of people
feel more comfortable accepting

the idea
that UFOs could be real.

I think Jacques has taken
people even further

in getting them to question

the very origin
of the phenomena.

POPE:
Jacques Vallée is
a hugely intelligent man.

He's a-a true
out-of-the-box thinker.

When he started,

a lot of the things that he was
saying were very fringe.

They've now become mainstream.

When the history
of this subject is written,

Jacques Vallée's name
will be writ large,

and rightly so.

NARRATOR:
For more than six decades,

Jacques Vallée has made
invaluable contributions

to help solve the UFO mystery,

and continues to even today.

Will his lifetime
of incredible research

and scientific exploration

soon lead to real answers
about what has been happening

in our skies
for thousands of years?

Only time will tell.

But one thing is certain:

whenever we arrive at the truth,

it will be largely due
to the work of Jacques Vallée.

I still haven't solved it.

(laughs)

Uh, but I felt that

in my life, I would not be able

to make a contribution
at the right level

to influence finding the answer.

I've made a contribution

alongside with a number
of very, very bright people,

um,

and all you can hope in science
is to make one contribution.

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